Fuzing Play and Politics: on Individualized Collective Action in Leisure

Leisure Sciences An Interdisciplinary Journal ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ulsc20 Fuzing Play and Politics: On Individualized Collective Action in Leisure Lise Kjølsrød To cite this article: Lise Kjølsrød (2021): Fuzing Play and Politics: On Individualized Collective Action in Leisure, Leisure Sciences, DOI: 10.1080/01490400.2021.1921639 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/01490400.2021.1921639 © 2021 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Published online: 27 May 2021. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 37 View related articles View Crossmark data Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=ulsc20 LEISURE SCIENCES https://doi.org/10.1080/01490400.2021.1921639 Fuzing Play and Politics: On Individualized Collective Action in Leisure Lise Kjølsrød Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY Today, widespread use of digital technologies transform cultural Received 11 December 2020 forms, among them leisure and art. This article analyzes nine cre- Accepted 15 April 2021 ative, political enactments on the ground, communicated on the KEYWORDS Internet. Five are rooted in the vitality and freedom of leisure, and Activism; digitalization; four spring from the dedicated work of professional artists. The tech- leisure; narrative; play niques applied in all of these actions are knitting/crocheting, allow- ing crowd production and crowd financing. Amateurs seem to experience less strain and more sociability in this type of activism than professionals do. Their efforts may be modest and imbued with individual gratification, but those who take part are nevertheless able to move among “peers,” announce a project, share in the con- struction of a political space, and likely to bring this positive experience to future civic/political involvements. The article’s proposition is that the digital turn has opened a participatory political potential growing directly out of pleasurable, everyday leisure. Creative enactments in public1 Currently, a myriad of individuals, groups and networks present themselves by staging political performances in public using craft or other means. Facilitated by the internet, ad hoc actions appear on the ground. Regardless of issue, there is usually a well-defined element of play in these actions, according to Huizinga’s (1944/1955, p. 203) definition of play, as each takes place within certain limits of space, time and meaning, and according to given although flexible rules.2 We shall see how leisurely knitters and professional artists negotiate their creativity within boundaries of recognizable principles; how they make use of expressive symbolism and apply the privileges of play to explore subject matters in original ways. CONTACT Lise Kjølsrød [email protected] Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, P.O. Box 1096, Blindern, Oslo 0316, Norway. 1My colleague, Professor Trude Lappegård, initially made me aware of knitters’ activism. I am also grateful for perceptive contributions from the editor and two anonymous referees. 2The mentioned constellation of characteristics in Huizinga’s definition differs from the usual dictionary versions of play with emphasis on enjoying or amusing oneself, or taking part in an activity for recreation. The opposite of play in Huizinga’s sense is not seriousness but real-life, which does not imply that play is unrelated to real-life, quite the contrary. ß 2021 The Author(s). Published with license by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. 2 L. KJØLSRØD The performance itself is the political statement, there is simply nothing higher to attain, claimed the political philosopher Hannah Arendt (1958/1998, p. 206). Greatness, or the specific meaning of each deed, does not lie in the articulation of motive nor in the consequences of the action. Regardless of how pure and impressive the rhetoric is, this is hardly more than a reflection of the actors’ psychological traits. What counts is the verve of the performance itself, its energeia. This article visits nine exemplary cases, five leisure projects and four art projects. All are high on energeia with an intended “artistic” imagery and a vigorous message, driven by a spirit of protest. These performances appeared on the open internet with promin- ent imagery and some verbal clarifications, and this is where I found them. Each is shown here as a vignette: a real-life instance of activism, communicated to the participants themselves and the public at large with a carefully designed and striking iconog- raphy.3 In order to compare and hopefully tease out characteristic features of the two cultural forms, leisure and art, only completed projects are included, all initiated by women. Each action addresses a concern beyond the participants’ immediate interests, stirs emotions and shapes interaction, not unlike events in social movements. However, the issues vary, the occurrences are separate and unrelated, and there is no overarching rhetoric. This article is not about creativity and craft as such, nor about a new social movement. Rather, its aim is to explore a type of leisure based activism, facilitated by the digital turn. This activism appears to be surprisingly mild on the individual, yet, may have significant implications on society. Already, the first vignette reveals some key points. Wool port: metaphor for a more vigorous community Yarn bombing comes in all formats, from small stunts to elaborate decoration of large structures. It can be seen as a type of nonpermanent and noninvasive graffiti, practiced by non-professionals and meant to cause no harm (Sierhuis, 2013). By contrast to much graffiti, urbanists and art historians seem to find expressions in yarn easy to like. Initially, it was a way of reclaiming cold or sterile public places, which underscores the thin line between street activism and street art. Today, some actors amuse themselves by placing colorful yarn in visible spaces, decorating a hydrant or dressing up a small statue, others have a more ambitious agenda. The two generously decorated control towers of the 98-foot industrial cranes in the photo below are located in Coquimbo, a coastal town in northern Chile (Fison, 2016,p. 2). According to Claudy Tapia Retamal, fashion designer and initiator of the local yarn bombing collective Lanapuerto (wool port), the idea is to emphasize and beautify the port’s infrastructure À cranes, boats and the like – as maritime history is what character- izes the local community. The group wants to smash the stereotype of a dreary and left- behind town and create positive identity of place through a series of decorated, iconic 3I apply vignettes much like urban geographer Loretta Lees (2008) does when I attempt to highlight a general argument by showing a selection of concrete situations with some nuance. In sociological and psychological research, vignettes usually denote an experimental method. To find out how respondents perceive a particular problem and/or balance considerations, they are asked to evaluate hypothetical but realistic accounts. LEISURE SCIENCES 3 Figure 1. Courtesy of Lanapuerto. objects showing more vigor. In addition to this cognitive element, they have a social ambition, a wish to draw local inhabitants into a joint endeavor (Figure 1). Themainideaofsuchprojectsistoshapeacrediblenarrativeandattachittopeople’smem- ory and feelings. To achieve this, dedicated activists rely on carefully chosen symbols and emo- tional triggers such as surprise, boldness, brightness, humor, and some will say beauty and poetry. Varieties of “poetics as politics” has a long history throughout the world. Plys (2020), for instance, analyses the political potential of a strong lyrical tradition in the Islamic region, dating back as far as the pre-Islamic Arabian Peninsula. Her emphasis is on how social and political systems shape the menu of social movements’ resistance tactics. Within contexts marked by lack of political rights, severe censorship and punishment of dissent, discord cannot be too explicit. Poetic fragments and other cultural materials can convey controversial infor- mation in subtle ways, foster sympathy, and counter feelings of fear associated with acts of resistance. Although the challenges are very different in modern societies, striking, appealing, and poetic statements may still sway participants and audiences. The semiotics of the decorated cranes are straightforward but their sheer size makes the imagery transcend the ordinary. Touches of magnificence and originality can be enough to invoke the necessary “magic,” also in the crucial media. Such demanding projects could not be staged without numerous contributions from off-line and on-line networks. Crowd production and crowd financing are essential, which many individual knitters can easily provide. Although participation emerges from individualized action frames, intertwined with personal lifestyle and self-expression, there is connectivity. Such joint individuality appears to be an increasingly frequent phenomenon

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